The invention herein is generally concerned with the cooking of foodstuffs, such as sea food, meat and the like, and more particularly relates to apparatus specifically adapted for cooking in the manner referred to as smoking. This basically involves, in conjunction with the heating of the food, the subjecting of the food to a rather dense smoky atmosphere so as to impart the desirable smoked flavor to the food. Any appropriate aromatic wood, such as hickory, can be used to generate the smoke.
Heretofore, the smoking of food has normally involved the use of rather substantial apparatus, sophisticated heat supply and distribution systems, and the expenditure of much time and effort. The resultant product, in turn, was usually produced in such quantity as to require specific storage facilities until such time as the product could be used.
Some prior efforts have been directed toward providing compact smokers which can cook, or more particularly smoke, small quantities of foodstuffs. However, such units are distinctly lacking in those features which one would desire in a portable smoker usable, as an example, directly at a camp site or fishing site. In this regard, the known smokers, even those which might be considered portable, are awkward complex structures requiring, at least in some cases, a sophisticated power source, such as electricity, and which require an inordinate amount of time to produce what in most cases is a less than satisfactory final product.
The following patents constitute the most pertinent prior art known to applicant:
______________________________________ U.S. Pat. No. INVENTOR ISSUE DATE ______________________________________ 2,573,772 NYSTEN November 6, 1951 2,789,877 PFUNDT April 23, 1957 2,894,448 HENDERSON ET AL July 14, 1959 3,081,692 SORENSEN March 19, 1963 3,333,526 KIRKPATRICK August 1, 1967 3,517,602 HORTON June 30, 1970 3,776,127 MUSE December 4, 1973 ______________________________________
The cookers or smokers presented in these prior art patents do not incorporate the structural simplicity of the apparatus of the present invention, nor do they incorporate the specific unique features, as shall be described presently, which enable the production of a smoked product which is highly acceptable to both taste and sight. Likewise, the known smokers appear to require a substantial length of time, running up to several hours, to arrive at a properly smoked product. This is directly contrary to applicant's apparatus wherein sea food is expertly and completely smoked within approximately twenty minutes with other meat products requiring only approximately forty minutes.